“IMPROVING STUDENTS’ SPEAKING ABILITY THROUGH THINK-PAIR-SHARE STRATEGY (A Collaborative Action Research on the Eleventh Grade Students of Office Administration 1 of SMK Negeri 1 Gorontalo in 2010/2011 Academic Year)”

Abstract

ABSTRACT The objective of this study is to improve the students’ speaking ability of the eleventh grade students of Office Administration 1, SMK Negeri 1 Gorontalo in 2010 / 2011 academic year by using Think-Pair-Share Strategy. This study is a collaborative classroom action research (CAR), in which the writer and the English teacher worked together. The teacher implemented the strategy and taught the students, while the writer observed the activities during the implementation of Think-Pair-Share. The study conducted in three cycles, using the following procedures: planning, acting, observing and evaluating, and reflecting. It was done to achieve the minimum passing grade. The minimum passing grade was 70 and the number of students who achieved the minimum passing grade was around 80% (29 students) of the students. The data of this study were collected from questionnaire, checklist, field notes and test. There were 36 students of the eleventh grade students of Office Administration 1 Gorontalo involved in this study. The findings of this study showed that Think-Pair-Share strategy could improve the students’ speaking ability and students’ participation. The improvement of the students’ speaking ability in expressing opinion could be seen from the number of the students who were able to pass the minimum passing grade 70. It was found that none of the students passed the passing grade in pre-test, in the first cycle there were 15 students (41.67%) who passed the passing grade. In the second cycle, there were 23 students (63.89%) who passed the passing grade. Finally, the students’ speaking test met the passing grade in the third cycle. There were 33 students (91.67%) who passed it. The improvement of the students’ participation could be seen from the increasing number of the students’ participation in each cycle. The students’ participation was categorized as participating students. The results showed that there were from 17 students (47.22%) in the first cycle participated in classroom interaction, 26 students (72.22%) participated in the second cycle and 34 students (94.44%) participated in third cycle. It is suggested that English teacher should apply Think-Pair-Share strategy to improve the students’ participation and speaking ability. Key words : Think-Pair-Share, Students’ Speaking Ability, Expressing Opini